Alan Perlis

Perlis takes on the oeuvre of early 20th century American poet Wallace Stevens and succeeds, albeit briefly. He posits that all of Stevens's poetry is a journey into the mechanisms of the imagination, that the observer can shape the observed into whatever the internal mind wants. The rule must work because now Perlis can, therefore, shape Stevens's poems into whatever he wants, thereby proving the thesis. This short book is a good journey into some of the trickier explications that Stevens's show more poems require, but I wouldn't spend too much time dwelling upon interpretation: I would simply read Stevens's work. show less